Croatia Vs North Macedonia Handball highlights Friendly Match 2025

Описание: Croatia Vs North Macedonia Handball highlights Friendly Match 2025
Seniors: Victory against North Macedonia with a lot of struggle
More difficult than expected, the Croatian men's senior national team defeated North Macedonia in a friendly match in Varaždin 27:25. It was the penultimate check of our handball players before the World Championship. In two days, they will face Slovenia in Zagreb.

CROATIA : D. Kuzmanović 5/23, I. Pešić 5/12, D. Duvnjak 3/4, M. Šoštarić 3/4, Z. Srna 6/8, I. Pavlović 1/3, M. Maraš 1/4, M. Mamić -/-, D. Mandić 1/1, T. Lučin -/-, I. Martinović 5/11, L. Šušnja -/-, M. Šipić 4/4, F. Glavaš 2/3, M. Jelinić 1/2, V. Načinović 0/1, coach: Dagur Sigurdsson (ISL)

NORTH MACEDONIA : N. Mitrevski 10/29, I. Galevski 0/3, M. Kizikj 5/8, M. Velkovski 1/2, I. Georgiev -/-, M. Mitev 2/4, V. Karasmanakis -/ -, N. Markovski -/-, F. Kuzmanovski 3/9, N. Kosteski 4/4, A. Petkovski -/-, Ž. Peševski 4/5, T. Jagurinovski 0/1, M. Lazarevski 1/1, I. Djonov 2/2, M. Stojkovikj -/-, P. Atanasijevikj 2/3, M. Serafimov 3/6, P. Atanasijevskij 3/4, selector Kiril Lazarov

A great atmosphere greeted the Croatian national team in the sold-out Arena in Varaždin. Coach Dagur Sigurdsson decided to leave six players in the stands: Matija Špikić , Diana Neris Ćeško, Luka Cindrić, Josip Šimić and Nikola Grahovac . On the other hand, Kiril Lazarov had all 19 players he brought to Croatia on the scoresheet.

Our starting lineup was as follows. Dominik Kuzmanović started at goal . The wings were Mario Šoštarić and David Mandić, and on the line Veron Načinović . On the outside positions. There were Domagoj Duvnjak, Ivan Martinović and Mateo Maraš. So we had two left-backs in the game, so Ivan Martinović played the role of organizer .

Our handball players had two early leads, but the Macedonians easily followed suit. Especially since Nikola Mitrevski opened the match excellently and made three saves in the first seven minutes. The guests responded to every Croatian goal in the same way, so the first ten minutes passed in a completely even game.

We recorded our first breakaway to a two-point lead in the 13th minute after the first counterattack (7:5). This forced the Macedonian coach to try a seven-on-six game. But he was penalized on his first attempt and immediately returned to a six-on-six game.

The moment Croatia went to plus three (9:6), Kiril Lazarov called for the first minute of rest. With a reason, because our defense was very good, and the Macedonians went more than five minutes without a goal. And when it seemed that we would easily bring the first part to an end, an unexpected fall followed. A lot of misses, technical errors, but also weak reactions in defense, and the guests ended the half with plus one (13:14). In the last five minutes, our handball players scored only one and conceded three goals. In addition to all that, Dominik Kuzmanović took a seven-pointer from Filip Kuzmanovski at 12:12. In other words, it could have been worse.

It took us less than five minutes in the second half to regain the lead (16:15). At 17:16, our team missed three seven-meter shots (saved by Marko Kizikj ), giving our opponents another chance to get back into the game. And they did. They responded to every one of our goals in the same way and kept us in suspense.

However, when entering the last quarter, the Croatian players again created two differences (21:19). And they had an attack to strengthen it a little more, but they didn't take advantage of it. An additional dose of encouragement was offered by Ivan Pešić , who collected three defenses in very few minutes.

In the last ten minutes, Croatia entered with a plus three (23:20). But they couldn't relax for a moment. The Macedonians pulled back brilliantly after every one of our mistakes and four and a half minutes before the end, they first reached minus one (24:23), and then immediately reached the tie (24:24). But they couldn't go any further. Croatia scored three goals in a row and led 27:24 with about 20 seconds left. In the end, the Macedonians scored with the sound of the siren for the final 27:25. Our goalkeepers had 10 saves. Five each. With six goals from eight attempts, the top scorer of the match was Zvonimir Srna . Ivan Martinović added five . The opponent's goalkeeper had a great day – Nikola Mitrevski made 10 saves, Marko Kizikj five, of which three were 7-meter shots. Žarko Peševski and Nenad Kosteski scored four goals each .

In two days, Croatia will have its final test against Slovenia in the Zagreb Arena at 8:15 PM. The first match at the World Cup will be played on January 15th at 8:30 PM against Bahrain.

VARAŽDIN: FRIENDLY MEETING

CROATIA – MACEDONIA 27:25

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